


a quiet night

by tomaetotomahtoe



Series: of wands and stun darts (and all the things in between) [2]
Category: Alex Rider - Anthony Horowitz, Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alex Rider Needs a Hug, Crushes, Gen, Harry Needs a Hug, M/M, Pining, Pre-Relationship, They all need hugs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-22
Updated: 2020-06-22
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:08:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,401
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24861322
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tomaetotomahtoe/pseuds/tomaetotomahtoe
Summary: Harry heads to Chelsea instead of the Leaky Cauldron after blowing up Aunt Marge. Jack and Alex resumes life post-Never Say Die.-----Alex stares bemused at the slightly soggy newspaper that Harry has left on top of his blankets. Is that deranged madman in the picture… moving? Ah, it seems to be set in a constant loop, like some sort of gif one might see on the computer, except that it’s on paper.Or not, he amends distantly, as the photograph of a pretty socialite in the gossip column breaks away from her fiancé’s lips to wink and blow a kiss at him. Not quite.
Relationships: Harry Potter & Alex Rider, Harry Potter/Alex Rider
Series: of wands and stun darts (and all the things in between) [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1798747
Comments: 6
Kudos: 150





	a quiet night

**Author's Note:**

> As of this point, Harry is 13, Alex is 15.

“Hi. I blew up my aunt. And I need a place to stay for the night.”

Alex, nonplussed, just stares at the boy at his door, cataloging his dirty worn jacket, a roll of newspaper tucked into one of the pockets, black hair unartfully sticking out in all possible directions, jeans frayed at the ends, torn and bloody on one knee, and looks at bright green eyes staring back into his own, his mouth set in a narrow, hard line. Harry carries a heavy vintage-style trunk with him on one hand, and an empty wire bird cage on the other. For Hedwig, he knows.

“Come on in then.” He acquiesces, stepping aside. “Do you need a bucket?” Harry looks a bit green around the edges.

“Nah, just–” he waves it off, “I’ve had an… interesting ride here, is all.” He steps into the entryway, carefully trying to avoid the carpeted areas with his sneakers, muddy from the rain outside. “Should I take off my shoes, do you think?”

“Yes, of course. Let me get some slippers.” Alex takes his trunk, bringing it up into his room and quietly setting it down at the side. He comes back down the stairs, and grabs some extra slippers left on the side of the patio - _Ian’s slippers_ , a voice whispers, one that he ignores- bringing it down the hallway to where Harry is toeing off his shoes. Alex keeps his voice low, “I left your trunk at the foot of my bed. You can take a shower upstairs, just keep it down when you’re going up because Jack hadn’t much sleep the past two days” she’s been researching an important court case, nightmares aside.

Harry nods, still looking slightly queasy, and leaves the cage at the side of the hallway, walking into the house and looking around with a sort of familiarity that comes with having stayed over more than a few times.

He asks softly, “How’s Mint?”

“Doing well.” Alex replies. “Hiding under the log and probably dozing off; she’s had a big mouse for dinner.” Mint referring to his ball python, a pretty little thing with pastel yellow and white patterns on its scales, enclosed in a large terrarium in the living room, glowing slightly in the corner from fluorescent lighting.

She’s not the best conversationalist, wanting to sleep most of the time, but Alex finds her laid-back mannerisms adorable, and convincing her to try different exotic rodents and birds is good practice for Alex to speak the snake language -or Parseltongue, as he now knows what it’s called by wizards- when Harry isn’t around.

Harry hums and nods in acknowledgement, turning to thread up the stairs to the room. Alex stays behind, gaze lingering on his back, at the blades of his shoulders, which have gotten broader.

It has been more than a half a year from the time Alex last saw him, not since Christmas, and he’s struck by the fact that Harry has since shot up like a particularly stubborn weed, lighting-scarred forehead reaching up slightly past his chin. Alex himself still has some growing left to do, in between schoolwork, recovery, his promised retirement from spy work and getting kidnapped by random assassins, but it seems that Harry might surpass his height soon enough, at this rate. The buffets he has at his magic school must have been doing him some good, Alex muses as he heads into the kitchen to put on the kettle.

Preparing two cups of tea -two sugars, no milk for Harry, one sugar and one milk for himself- he takes out the tupperware of leftover pasta from dinner, pours it out onto a plate and heats it up in the microwave. It’s its a little over nine in the evening, but if Harry is here after one of the Dursley’s Important Dinners, one that he needed to go well in order to be allowed out of school on the weekends, as written in his letter, after _blowing up his aunt_ , as he said– well. Alex reckons that he mightn’t have eaten much food, if at all.

_Since he’s downstairs, he takes a peek into Jack’s room. The visual confirmation of her fast asleep in bed, stress lines visible on her face but safe and_ **_here_ ** _all the same – he relaxes minutely, tension uncurling in his stomach. He steps inside, does one last sweep for any bugs or hidden cameras, before he could muster enough courage to force himself back out of the room and close the door._

When the microwave dings, Alex places the teas, the pasta, some utensils, and a piece of chocolate cake on a tray – Jack bought the cake to treat herself, filled with indulgent layers of ganache and sponge, but Alex thinks she probably won’t mind it this one time, it being a special occasion and all. He carries it up to his room before setting it gently on his study desk, shuffling the cake out to hide it behind one of his picture frames.

Across the hall, he could hear the soothing sounds of the shower turned on, the gentle splashing of water as Harry rumbles through Jack’s various assorted bottles of shampoos and intensive haircare masks. Feeling lighter than he had in a while, Alex allows himself a small smile, laughing slightly at himself, before rummaging in one of the cupboards to pull out the portable floor bed he uses for whenever Harry or Tom sleeps over at his house.

After untucking the mattress and fluffing up the kinks from the folds, Alex reaches over his bed to take some pillows, before he stops and blinks at the thing on his bed.

Alex stares bemused at the slightly soggy newspaper that Harry has left on top of his blankets. Is that deranged madman in the picture… moving? Ah, it seems to be set in a constant loop, like some sort of _gif_ one might see on the computer, except that it’s on paper.

Or not, he amends distantly, as the photograph of a pretty socialite in the gossip column breaks away from her fiancé’s lips to wink and blow a kiss at him. Not quite.

_Magic_ , he thinks, picking up the newspaper and absentmindedly flipping through the pages, is pretty amazing. Would be more amazing without all the secrecy surrounding it; although Alex’s not the one to talk – his own files are probably bleeding ink from lines and lines of redacted information. Alex is so submersed in secrets, whether he is with them or is being kept from them, that he’s surprised that it doesn’t all just start leaking out of his ears.

“What’cha looking at?” Harry peeks over his shoulder. His hair is still damp from his shower, droplets flying off the tip and dripping on to his soft grey cashmere t-shirt, the one that Alex bought and keeps in his cupboards for Harry to wear when he comes over, towel wrapped around his shoulders. His glasses are still slightly misted up from the steam in the bathroom. Alex can smell the musky, peppery soap that he himself uses, mingling with the contradicting scents of fresh-cut wood and aged parchment that is so uniquely _Harry_ , that his heart stutters a bit in his chest, a flutter of pleasure tingling in his gut.

“Alex?” He hears Harry speak up again, and Alex realises with horror that his eyes had been closed, head tilted sideways towards Harry and _sniffing_ at his neck. He snaps his head back down so fast that that he nearly got whiplash, noting with no small amount of relief that Harry was still concentrated on the newspaper in his hands.

“I-it w-was,” He coughs, takes a second to recover, willing the blush to recede back down his neck and tries to focus on the topic at hand. “I-I mean, I saw this guy on our regular papers. An escaped convict who threw a bomb down at Westfield years ago, blowing up half the street and killing thirteen people. I was wondering how he could’ve survived the radius of his own blast. I guess this explains why.”

A magical explosion, caused by the single curse from a wand. The same wands held by children ages eleven and up, used to make feathers float and spark fireworks from the tips, or as convenient flashlights in the dark. Thin wooden sticks with so much _danger_ potential he’s glad that SCORPIA doesn’t liaise with wizards or witches. Gods, Alex had to suppress a shudder just thinking about it. 

He can’t even imagine the damage Julia Rothman could do with a wand. Or the Grimaldi twins. Or anyone that he has ever faced, really. The world might’ve spontaneously burst into flames a long time ago, and no one would be the wiser.

Harry hums, walks a couple steps forward so that they end up side by side, and takes the paper from his hands. The sides of Alex’s palms warms and tingles at the parts where Harry fingers brushed past his skin. _Damn puberty hormones_.

“They say he’s looking to kill me, after what I did to Voldemort.” Harry says quietly, watching intently from the corner of his eyes as Alex stiffens. “that he broke out of Azkaban and all, from a fortress on an island set in the middle of the North Sea, to do it.”

At this, Alex closes his eyes, forcefully pushing down at the rage _horror_ that seem to surge up all at once, almost knocking the breath out of him. He manages to settle it into something simmering instead, a kind of icy cool anger that could be controlled, that could be used to cut.

Not at Harry though. Never at Harry, just at the shitty hand of cards that life seems to have dealt him.

Still, he can’t stop the bitterness from creeping into his tone when he tries to joke, “you just can’t catch a break, can you?” The not-quite question falls flat between them.

Harry smirks derisively, the curl on the side of his lips looking overly twisted and _wrong_ on his face, as his eyes locks blankly on the photograph of Sirius Black lurching out and snarling towards them from the newspaper. “No, I guess not. Trouble just always seems to find me.” He huffs out a short, harsh laugh, as his hands ball into tight grips, crinkling the sides of the papers.

Alex sighs, feeling exhausted as all the fight leaves him suddenly, his shoulders hunching over. In the past year, Alex has faced villains of all sort, dismantled elaborate plans of revenge and greed, outsmarted convicts and felons more experienced than he. But he remains so far out of his depth with _Harry’s_ world, unable to really comprehend what his kind can do with their magic, how they can heal broken bones with the flick of a wand, and disappear them altogether with another.

He thinks back on the letters, words weaving tales of vampires, of unicorns, of a fifty foot-long basilisk that can kill you when they look into your eyes. Of faces etched into the back of another person possessed by a bodiless spirit. And.

He understands that he can’t protect Harry. Not from his world. Nor can he attempt to shield him from it, to fly him to remote corners of the world, hiding his identity.

_Trouble just always seems to find me._

But he can do one thing, Alex thinks, straightening up and turning towards Harry, whose face has gone slack now, still staring blankly at- _through_ the page. Alex reaches out his hands to gently tug the papers from Harry’s, fingers curling over his fists, patiently coaxing them to open. When they finally loosen, he takes the newspaper and tosses it lightly to the side, not really caring to look where it lands, before he pulls Harry towards him, tucking his head under his chin and wrapping his arms around him.

Harry freezes, arms awkwardly curled up in between their chests.

“Thank you,” breathes Alex, not bothering to hide the fondness and utter _joy_ in his voice. “ _Thank you_ for surviving. For getting through this, despite everything. For coming back.” Overwhelmed by a sudden wave of his own emotions, he fights back the tears gathering at the corners of his eyes, choking out in a quiet voice, “I love you.”

And he does, doesn’t he? He loves Harry Potter. More than the distant longing he feels for parents he never really knew. More than the familial respect he has for Ian, who’s betrayal-grooming him, moulding him into the perfect operative- leaves a still-festering wound that burns as much as his grief for losing his uncle, his guardian, his _father_. More than the easy companionship he has with Tom, and more than the loyal and humbling kinship he has for Jack Starbright, a love borne out of her sacrifice and bloodshed, having stuck with him through thick and thin. Certainly more than any recent attraction that is brought about by instinct and butterflies in his stomach.

He’s loved the boy since that fateful day on the rooftop, where he found a kindred soul in a shy boy dressed in clothes too big for him and who hands out his trust so easily. Who wholeheartedly tried to teach him a snake language concerning entirely of hisses, who attempted to establish an approximate pronunciation and grammatical guideline even though everything sounds like English to him anyway. Who braves all the horrifying things that life throws at him, and is strong enough to come back to Alex, even if he ends up a little more broken each time.

He thanks _Magic_ the day Harry ‘popped’ into his life, for it is magic who has gifted him a friend, a partner, a _someone_ to Alex.

Thinking about it makes him hug a little tighter.

He senses the exact moment where Harry snaps, when _all the tension rushes out from his frame_ , and Alex feels more than hears Harry choking back a sniffle even as he wiggles his arms out to curve them around Alex’s back, hands clutching tightly at the fabric of his pyjamas, _pressing_ himself fiercely against Alex’s bigger frame, as if trying to merge into him, to sink into the cocoon of warmth as if it would protect him from all harm and heal all his worries, and he lets go.

*

Alex’s not so sure how much time has passed.

Somehow, they ended up curled up against the side of his bed, sitting on top of the foldable foam mattress on the floor. Harry has calmed down from earlier, now muffling hiccups instead of the heaving, shuddering sobs that had wrecked his frame when he let loose the tight reins he has over his feelings of sadness, always hidden first under impulsive spurts of sharp, explosive anger.

Alex glances up at the clock on his bedside table. _Almost eleven._

He shifts the weight on top of his shoulder, wincing as the movement pulls taunt at the sensitive tissues over his chest. Harry jerks up, muttering an apology. His eyes are swollen and red, cheeks puffy and sticky with dried tears and snot, but he looks to be in a much better state than the Harry that Alex found at the door earlier that evening, eyes stingingly bright and face set in jarringly guarded lines, body coiled with tension, as if ready to head into battle.

“It’s a bit late, but do you want to eat something?” Alex asks quietly, lifting his hand to Harry’s forehead and brushing a few strands of hair away from his eyes, the tips of his fingers touching lightly on his scar. His glasses laid above them, on Alex’s bed.“I heated up some pasta. Might be a bit cold by now, though.”

As if on cue, Harry’s stomach grumbles, and he huffs before mumbling an affirmative. Alex holds back a smile at the sight.

Tugging down the blanket from his bed, he wraps it around Harry, passing him his glasses, before withdrawing his arms and pushing himself up to walk to his desk, wiggling and pressing away the aches and needles out of his limbs as he does so.

He takes the tray from the desk and shuffles back, carefully setting it on their spot against the side of the bed, picking up the plate and utensils for Harry, who shyly accepts them and starts to eat, seemingly embarrassed from his outburst earlier. Alex frowns at this, and he couldn’t help to reach for Harry’s arm, willing him to look back at him.

Harry’s gaze locks on him, slightly curious, fork still in his mouth.

“Errugh?” He not-quite-asks around his bite of pasta, and subsequently blushes.

This time, Alex really can’t hold back his chortle, which turns into a full blown laughter when Harry joins in, giggling to the extent that his fork spasms, flicking bits of tomato sauce into the air and causing another bout of laughter. The two of them desperately try to muffle themselves for fear of waking up Jack downstairs, and ends up sniggering into their palms, slightly hunched over like naughty children.

Alex looks over at Harry, and feels his heart swells at him looking a little more like the teenager he is, rather than that of a vigilant soldier. That both of them are allowed this one small respite, even if its just for this quiet night.

He reaches over and ruffles his hair, causing Harry to scowl good-naturedly. “Finish your pasta.”

While Harry focuses on his plate, Alex digs the first-aid kit from under his bed, murmuring for permission to tend to his injuries, on the knee he saw bleeding in the rain that has since scarred over, but he can’t help but want to treat it anyways. At least apply some antiseptic.

Harry lets him, too used to him treating the various cuts and bruises from their school days, when Dudley had thrown harder, stones with jagged edges instead of smooth pebbles, or when he tripped him over the road, cackling as his face slides across the asphalt.

When Alex finishes with the knee, rolling down the hem of his pants, Harry holds out one of his hands, two deep gashes on his palm, muttering that he tripped backwards and fell over into the gutter. Alex quirked up an eyebrow at him, but says nothing as he clean and bandaged the wounds.

_Later that night, Harry whispers about a black dog, a huge hulking wolf thing with large gleaming eyes standing in the shadow of a dark alleyway. “It stared at me like it knew me,” he confesses, griping tightly at his blankets, scrunching up the fabric. “Like it was looking for me.”_

When he finishes wrapping the gauze, Alex quickly packs away his first-aid, and heads straight to his desk again, ignoring Harry’s sound of surprise. He takes the cake from behind the frames, bringing the small plate over to Harry, whose eyes widened.

Alex glances at the clock. _Ten minutes to twelve_.

“The day’s not over yet. Happy Birthday, Harry.” He whispers, smiling softly down at the black-haired boy in front of him, whose eyes are fixed on the cake, lower lip wobbling.

His heart pangs at the sight. Alex puts the cake down, reaching around to hug him again. “Oh Harry,” he sighs, “did you really think I’ve forgotten? I’m sorry I didn’t-” _get you any presents_ , he finishes in his head, feeling bitter for all that has happened the past year; for the errands that have taken him out of the country time and time again, that pushed him away from his friends, that drained away at his attention and energy to even check up on the people that he treasures.

Harry is already shaking his head, pushing away from his chest. “No, _no_ ” he insists defiantly. “I was just happy.” He rubs away at his eyes.

“You know–” his voice hitches, “h-how little I look forward to my birthdays. I’ve almost forgotten it myself, what with everything that has happened today.”

Avoiding his gaze, Harry looks down to take the plate from the floor, fork cutting a piece of cake.

“I’m just remembering, not for the first time, how it feels to be glad _that_ it’s my birthday, is all.” Shoving cake into his mouth, Harry lifts his head to grin at him widely and cheekily, teeth unapologetically smeared brown with bits of chocolate ganache.

Alex says nothing, although his lips quirked at the sight; he knows Harry is going it on purpose, trying to cheer him up by dumbing down one of his deep, heart-wrenching confessions with a joke, softening the blow.

He lets him win this round. His sweet, _kind_ Harry, who understands him as much as Alex understands him back.

He ruffles his hair again. “Eat your cake.”

*

Harry wakes up.

He opens his eyes to the ceiling, observing the strands of reddish and indigo hues scattered across the ceiling, as night transitions to precipice of not-quite dawn. Watches as the first light catches on the condensation of the window, dancing and splitting into shades of pinks and yellows.

He turns and shuffles to the side of the bed, peering around to see Alex curled up on the floor mattress, mouth slightly open and snoring softly, a thin line of drool flowing down the side of his cheek.

It’s so different from the unruffled exterior he usually puts on that Harry had to hide a snicker in his pillow.

In the quiet of the morning, Harry feels more at peace than he had in a while. Theres no chaotic bustling that comes from sleeping in the same room as five other teenage boys, and there’s no empty sense of stillness that accompanies his room in Privet Drive, where he is supposed to be quiet and pretend that he doesn’t exist.

Because he could, Harry stares unabashedly at Alex’s sleeping form.

From where his right leg is tossed out of the blanket, pale white lines spiral up his ankle, a remnant from being trapped in a tank with a mutated jellyfish.

There’s little white spot at the inner of his left wrist, from when he tried smoking for the first time. While choking out his first inhale, he tripped over a snail into a tree root.

(Harry still doesn’t let him live it down – it’s the funniest thing he’s heard since sliced bread.)

Harry thinks about the gun wound under his shirt.

It is an unspoken rule for them to not keep secrets from one another. It’s easier to do so than one might think, despite the constant danger they finds himself in – what with Harry’s misadventures at school, or Alex’s all out plummet into spy work after the death of his uncle one and a half years ago

Not many are aware of the nature of their friendship. Ron and Hermione knows of his muggle friend from primary school, but Harry doesn’t share much, greedily hoarding information about him like how a dragon guards its treasure.

He imagines it’s the same for Alex, because they’re each other’s _best_ best friend first, other best friends aside.

It works out for the both of them, because the idea of _another_ possessed Quirrell wandering into muggle Chelsea to attack his friend now seems just as unlikely as any of Alex’s enemies (or MI6) being able to reach at Harry at Hogwarts.

Through the letters he received, Harry knows Alex is far from vulnerable.

Harry knows that Alex had been dangled upside-down above a crocodile pit, had plummeted down in a hunk of metal from outer space, had decimated entire criminal organisations, and remained the last one standing. And just thinking about this still boggles Harry’s mind still because it sounds like something out of a super spy movie, albeit a PG version with less curvy love interests.

(He very determinedly does _not_ think about Sabrina Pleasure.)

Still, Harry sees the toll it has taken from him. He hides it well, but to someone who sees him only every once in a while, the changes are easy to decipher – and he just looks _so tired_ , all the time. 

More than once through the night, Harry would wake from his sleep to see Alex tiptoeing out of the room, heading downstairs. Presumably to check on Jack, who a few months ago was officially considered dead.

Even now, he lies between Harry and the open space of the room, as if guarding from potential threats.

While the organisation has been lying low during Alex's recovery, Harry can't help but have the terrifying thought that MI6 still has more in store for him. Harry has never met Tulip Jones, but he thinks he hates her. Alex says she is a vast improvement from the previous director, that she has argued for his case and wants to let him be, but something in Harry just _knows_ she’s in for the long con. 

(…Somehow, she reminds him of someone. He can’t quite put his finger on who, though.)

In spite of -or perhaps because of- being thirteen now, Harry has many worries about the days to come. He worries about being expelled, for one. He worries on whether Hedwig is doing good at the Burrow, if she has managed to reach there safety, if she’s eaten. He worries about Sirius Black the murderer, he worries about the strange dog he saw before he called the knight bus, and. He worries about Alex.

Harry knows Alex is far from vulnerable.

But he wants to protect him too, like how Alex has always protected him.

There’s a shuffling sound at the bottom of the bed, as an arm emerges under the blanket to poke Harry’s forehead, breaking his train of thought. Startled, Harry moves his gaze from Alex’s chest (he wasn’t staring at it really! Just lost in thought. Yes, that’s all there is to it) to his face.

“Stop staring at me,” Alex mumbles sleepily, “And thinking so loudly. It’s our lazy day, so wake up later.” He closes his eyes and prompting resumes snoring. Louder this time, no doubt faked. Harry muffles another snicker.

He flops himself back on his back, admiring the soft gold shimmers that is now spread across the ceiling. _Lazy day, huh?_

He closes his eyes, thinks about colours and cakes and quiet mornings, and drifts back to sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> a ministry owl arrives later, and jacky feeds it bacon.
> 
> hurrah, harry is not expelled! but fudge wants to see him doh. just to check on him, and shake his hand for a bit.
> 
> on 1 sept alex sees him off at the hogwarts express, and wishes him an utterly boring, uneventful year.
> 
> but harry comes back later and 'surprise i have a godfather but like he's on the run and could he stay in your house for a while?'
> 
> he stays.
> 
> -
> 
> thank you for reading! please comment if u like it/hate it/have any opinions at all because i wanna know how im doing lol! no beta so if there are typos or grammar/wording mistakes please let me know :) have a goood day


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